Adzerak's book o' sketches

[Adzerak]

The progress and final entry for the Racnor, devourer of warrios Creature of the week.
Decided I wanted to repaint it some and am in the process of doing that, making the hues and values more clear. Or less murky at least.



Been doing more speedies. Helps me getting away from the concept of having to over render stuff. Must learn to simplify more and pay attention to focal points.




Sketches from the pocket-sketchbook




Aaand a little castle study!

[Adzerak]

Update time!


Did a study of one of Cole Eastburn's old grayscale monsters from the old CA forums.
Really like how he renders form and gets that sculpty feel. Should have played around with different brushes tho. Aw well, next time! Original: http://www.conceptart.org/forums/attachm...1234093932



Bunch of 30 min-ish speedies.

"Ping-pong Champion"


"Stuck under a rock"


"Seal Protector" alt: Blubberborne



Scans!






Long time since I did a watercolor. Felt great to be at it again!



A WIP of a commission I'm doing. Kinda challenging, doing big ol' dinosaur creatures that can't look too menacing since this painting's for a 6 year old girl.



Rebirth. Pleased with the lighting in this one.

[desirulz123]

I'm really liking your designs, and i like how you render. I see you have improved tremulously great job, keep up the good work :D

[Adam Lina]

Thanks for stopping by my sketchbook! I have to agree your rendering is very nice. I like your colors as well. Your compositions could be stronger though. You mentioned doing more speed paints to work on this. I'd do thumbnails to try to explore as many ideas as possible. The problem with a speed paint as a comp study is its more about slapping something together that readable to other people. With a thumbnail its just for you so theres no need to make things look like anything. Use abstract shapes as place holders and explore basic elements of balance, contrast, focal points and overlapping shapes. Just my 2 cents!

[Adzerak]

desirulz123: Thanks man, and I will!

Adam Lina: Hey, thanks for stopping by yourself! Very good point there about the compositions, just beginning to understand the importance of exploring ideas through thumbnails. Have some exercises planned for a day when I'm feeling a bit more altert and disciplined heh xD







A good thing about doing these speedpaints is that it really helps me understand how often I fall into my comfort zone and do similar stuff from similar angles.

"Lightning Demon"

"Big Eater"

"Return to the Flame"

"Crowd of Worshippers"

Moss Knight

Moss Knight attempt 2


A bit more time spent on MossKnight nr 2. Now with friends!
If this had a flavor text it'd be something like "Their souls will never leave these woods, and neither will yours"

[Archreux]

Hey, man!

I'm really liking your sketchbook. There's been some really great improvement in just a couple of pages up to this point. Your color, light, and materials have had a significant jump in quality. Which really seems to have helped you create a lot of mood with these more recent paintings.

I'm in agreement with Adam when I say that doing some thumbnails would help strengthen your compositions. That commission you're working on with the girl and the dinosaurs is probably one of the more interesting paintings composition wise.

Looking forward to your next update. :]

[Adzerak]

Thanks for that feedback crit-bump there, Archreux! Very important for me to get a kick in the ass about the importance of composition. It has gotten a bit neglected of late. I Also feel that the dino pic is way beyond my other work composition wise now that i think about it xD More overlaps and movement.
I really like getting stuck just rendering dudes standing around with swords lol.

So, did this exercise by Bobby Chiu, where he did some abstract compositions from which you're supposed to paint something from. Found it to be a pretty sweet way of hammering in a more abstract way of thinking about compositions, how certains shapes can interact with one another and look pleasing to the eye.


Some thumbs of my own.


A preparatory study for that girl with the dinosaurs piece!


More speedie ones. Trying to focus more on the compositions here,
but as Adam pointed out, speedies aren't really a good way of studying composition. However I find it works really nice as an outlet for me to experiment with stuff and not get too hung up on a single painting. Let it go (x2)!
"Bridge Troll". Too ambitious for that short timespan. Simplifyyy maaaan!

"Were-owl". Reminds me of a grade-school teacher I had. You all know the one. What he lacks in owlish wisdom he makes up for in pervertedness.

"Ash Maiden" This one turned out pretty well I think.

[KurtJeremy]

yummy sketchbook you have here! awesome stuff, also the speedies are hilarious :D

[AngeliquevdMee]

Just look at how much you are improving! The thumbnails look really nice in value, but i feel your pain with compositions, lol. If you have trouble drawing a character in a certain pose and composition you can maybe try manga studio if you dont have it... it has a 3D tool with pre-made characters and you can change pose and perspective + do up and down shot etc. It's really nice :)

[Jaik]

So much work!!

Nice job too. You are slowly leveling up every aspect of your art, especially your colours :)
Great to see such improvement. Keep on the hard work :D

[Adzerak]

@KurtJeremy: Heh thanks. They're really fun to make, feels like i'm working in a blood craze in those 30 mins and some random stuff can happen xD

@AngeliquevdMee: Sounds really sweet, have to give it a shot sometime. Might be a great way to improve!

@Jaik: Leveling is slow but feels like some progress yes :)



So. I'm liking some aspects of this piece so far. Like that dinosaur in the background, the lighting and shape on him. Think I've botched the composition a bit by cropping the image and also messing around with the overall lighting. Going to tweak it a lot before final.



Scan compilations from the tiny ass moleskin :)

[Janos]

Hey Adzerak !!!

I can see your progression :) I like your moleskin sketches draw more from life !! thats really good and helpful to understand ::)

keep the good work coming ...keep working hard !!!

[Adzerak]

Indeed, Janos. Should really draw more from life, especially in that moleskin since i usually carry it with me!

Feeling a bit inactive as of late. Me and my girlfriend broke up so I guess I've been filling that emptiness inside of me with some Witcher 3. Hasn't been that much painting but it's starting to flow again :)



Composition thumbses, woooo!


A co-worker.


A sketch for a water color painting-to-be for my dad's birthday. When I grew up he sometimes tried to fool me and my sister that he was this super hero, who had a big snake for nemesis, 'cause why not. Thus this motive xD


Bunch of 30-mins.
"Adventure's End."

"Beard Game"

"Shapeshifter's true form"

"Olaf the legendary axeman"

"Witches' ruins"


Been rendering and altering the Witchers' ruins some :) Some more work will be put into this for sure

[Adzerak]

Update time again!
Mostly working towards building something that will hopefully resemble a portfolio. That's why I'm so slow with updates from time to time.


This one is nearly done I guess, needs some more tweaks to it and I need a break from it to notice what I want to change. But if you have ideas and imput, don't hesitate!



Two more wips of stuff I wish to render a lot more on too see if they are worthy!






Sketch and some 30 min speedies why not :)



"Builder Mage"


"Space warlock"



"Farewell"

[Bjulvar]

Awesome sketches man! You've really captured a sense of verticality in your recent ones. I especially like the Builder Mage one, pretty cool concept overall, would love to see it more designed and fleshed out. Potential! Also feels like your designs are getting better and unique flair to them.

ARe you done with the commissioned piece of the girl with the dinosaurs? If not, I think her face feels a bit too bright and unstructured. Maybe your working with an overexposed photo or something similar. But I suggest Bringing in some darker values. Could be interesting if her head interacted with one of the creatures more too, but that would demand a bit of a rework and might not be worth it!
Maybe something to study would be some renaissance masters since they're very good at making aspects of a painting interact and lead the eye.

Sorry about your girlfriend aswell man. That sucks, if you want to chat or something you can hit me up on skype! You should find me via: Patrik Antonescu or bjulvar

Keep up the great work man, it's really paying off! :)

[Adzerak]

Bjulvar: Thanks for the words man! Think I'm actually gonna work some more on that other builder mage, the one who's more close up and not as clear if it's fantasy or sci-fi. Didn't label that one as builder mage but that's what it is I guess ;P
That's a real sweet tip for dinosaur girl! It's still very much a WIP, haven't done much to the face to be honest. But yea  I have a reference photo that's way overexposed, and I didn't even think about it til you said it xD Will fix it when I give it a go once more! And as far as the interacting in the painting goes. Have thought about how to approach it, how much of a slave I should be to the reference photo. Guess the parents wanna see their little girl or something heh. But will take it into consideration.
And sure man I'll add ya and we'll skype it up sometime!



Been working on completing some paintings but grow tired of posting endless WIPs of them xD So here's some quicker stuff.

Bunch of small sketches from imagination and from life.



Another collection of spitpaints.


"After the mage wars"



Tiger Lady attempt 1


Tiger Lady 2


Evil Duck

[Adzerak]

Oh man, been away from here for so long. Mostly worked on them wips tho.
Working on that Witcher fanart and I cannot simply disappoint old Geralt. Also, new glasses now so hello crisp paintings! (at least they look crisper to me now, same as always for you maybe.)

But here's some stuff other stuff.









Sloppy spitpaint. But I liked the idea.

[hedgie]

I really enjoyed looking through your sketchbook, a lot of great work! I particularly like your speedpaints, they have a lot of energy to them 

For the girl with the dinosaurs; the only thing that looks a little off is the face. I don't know if the commissioner wants an exact likeness, but if not, you could try making the eyes a little bigger; also bringing down her hairline could help

[Adzerak]

Hedgie: Thanks for flipping through my stuff and leaving a comment :) The deal with that dinosaur painting was that yes, the comissioner wanted a likeness of her grandchild and that made things kind of tricky. They didn't want a portrait so I had to insert her into that environment while maintaining some semblance of her, hairline and all.

Still working on finishing paintings, but in the meantime, here's more sketches of things from mind and observation.

[Mechanizoid]

Hey man, there's impressive amount of work in this sketchbook! :) You're definitely improving, keep it up. I'd suggest paying more attention to your shading in the traditional drawings. Some of it looks scribbly and messy, and that looks kind of awful. ^^;

I'll be watching.